The Things They Heard
by KrisEleven
Summary: They thought they had left them in the past, but they have never stopped hearing the names of those abandoned, or forgotten.
1. Never Stopped Hearing Her Name

The mistress heard echoes from the yard. In the market, she could hear servants, shop keepers, and guards talk about it. She walked with her head high sure that they only did this because she was there, spiteful creatures, and she refused to listen to a word of it.

The master heard the other merchants talk about her when he was on the other side of the room, or when they thought he was too involved in another conversation to pay attention – but he always heard when _that _name was mentioned, even after all this time. He knew the stories were not true, that this was a ploy from someone trying to distract him from the business – those Thatchers maybe, who were nothing but bakers who wanted to get in on the natron trade.

The first of their servants they heard telling those tales they had beaten and dismissed from the house.

But still, the Chandlers heard the strangest stories.

Tales of entire pirate fleets sinking into the ocean outside of a Living Circle temple, destroyed by the rage of a child.

They heard her name repeated in other tales from the Emelan capital. They heard that she travelled north with the Duke and put out forest fires, that she was involved in halting a plague.

Years passed and the stories grew more fantastic. She brought rain, she attacked with lightning, she could bring winds to fill the sails of ships. There were tales that she could hear on the wind, that she was a weather-mage, one of the few, and that she was offered a fortune to do war magic in Sotat.

Tales from merchants in the south brought images of murderers, revolutions and glass dragons.

They heard that the Namornese Empress had tried to keep her in Namorn. They heard that the Imperial Will had failed.

They didn't believe a word of it. Oh, they had seen her for how strange she was. They had lived with lightning and hail when their child had a temper tantrum, winds when she was pouting and rain when she cried. She had caused her father to sink into the ground during _that_ argument, and it had taken three cousins to get him out again. But, the daughter they had abandoned had been useless, contrary and frightening. They would never have given her up if she had value, and so the stories must be false.

If, sometimes, the mistress missed her child and if, sometimes, the master thought he had been too rash and if, only sometimes, they thought they had made a mistake….

They never said it out loud for anyone else to hear.

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A/N Thanks to Alliriyan, my always-beta, no matter how many times I tell you I'm searching for others. Edited: 12/01/10


	2. Long Forgotten

A/N This story was supposed to be a one-shot, but LunaSphere was particularily evil and managed to coerce me into writing this. Special thanks to Luna for that and for betaing. Thanks also to Sweet Sassy Sarah and Alliriyan for looking this over and encouraging me in my desperate bids for attention. ;)

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Charun Lykaen sat at his desk, candles and a lamp lit around him to stave off the coming darkness. He still had a pile of reports to read through for the Intelligence Minister of the King of Olart and was stubborn and prideful enough that he would not go to bed before they were done, even though his head ached and his eyes were beginning to struggle to focus on the pages before him.

_One more,_ he told himself, setting aside papers on the activity of a small fiefdom on the border of their neighbouring country, Anderran. Smuggling was suspected, but it would be up to the Minister to suggest action to the King, not Charun. His suggestion, however, would be to watch the income carefully. No need to share the nation's modest wealth with others.

_Now this is interesting…_ Charun thought, reading the code over quickly. Apparently the Count Albannon fer Yarven had thought of a creative way to combat the recent drought on his lands. Messages had been sent into Summersea for the services of two mages, Briar Moss and Trisana Chandler.

It was an interesting way to get around the King's refusal to allow Temple staff to work unaccompanied by royal supervision and permission within the realm's borders. It was stupid, Charun thought (but never, ever said). But while these mages were linked to the temples and fer Yarven's cousin there, they were undoubtedly not dedicates and the Court could do little more than frown and grumble.

And they were so good at that.

Charun slipped open the reports on the mages, reading the boy's first. Briar Moss, a plant mage of obvious renown. Charun had heard many tales of the boy prodigy a few summers ago, when he had travelled to Namorn and succeeded in thwarting the Empress's will. They had all heard of her fury, and the surprising story of the power of these… _children_. For no one could deny that they were barely adults.

But he was surprised by the rumours and information his people had been able to collect on the plant mage. Entire theories wound about an experience in an earthquake where four children (and a _dog_, of all things) survived underground and emerged, not only alive, but miraculously enhanced in their magical capabilities.

Charun read about pirate attacks where plants rioted under his care, killing the attackers, where thorns and packets of seeds were as dangerous as war magic. He shivered at the thought as one of his two candles spluttered out.

The reports from the plague mentioned his abilities as a healer and a medicine-maker, but there were darker rumours only whispered in recent years that perhaps his teacher's illness had been more serious than let on. Whispers that could never be verified, his reports cautioned, but which were from reputable sources.

Charun thought of the power necessary to do what was suggested. The lamp flickered and died and he only leaned closer to the candle, unwilling to drag his eyes from the page.

The following years, leading up to the trip to Namorn, were vague and parts were missing, but even the bones of this mage's story were enough to raise the hair on the back of Charun's neck. An entire estate turned into a forest which no one could tame, standing as a reminder of a noble's cruelty, or so the people of the street said. The war had erased all possibility of gathering information, but rumours had survived even that devastation. Rumours that his vines and thorns had ripped through many soldiers, that his knives had done almost as good a job…

Charun knew all about the Namornese incident, and only skimmed through that section of the report, reading of the way he had charmed the Empress only to defeat her best defence and her great-mage protector when he refused to stay, when he and his sisters had defied the Imperial Will.

He sat back from the report, rubbing his tired eyes. He wasn't sure what his suggestion should be, and was glad it was only to the Intelligence Minister, and not to the King himself, to whom he would have to make it. This boy-mage undoubtedly could help one of their most productive lands prosper again. However, he had proved capable of defying more powerful persons than the King of Olart could hope to produce in a _decade_, and that would inspire a certain paranoia in the most seasoned ruler.

_How does that Duke of Emelan sleep?_

He reread the reports quickly, synthesizing them into a condensed set of papers for the Minister to deal with the next day. It was as he was doing this that he noticed the most unremarkable of facts: the boy had been born in Hajra, Sotat.

Charun closed his eyes for a moment, recalling a long-forgotten face with golden-brown skin. She had had large, dark eyes that had seemed to dance with every joy, and fill with tears at every hint of sorrow. Surrounded by black hair, her face had shone in the port city of Hajra and had captivated him from the first moment Charun had seen her. Almost a year, they had had together. Almost a year before he was recalled to the capital, an active agent then, before his injury had moved him to his desk job.

Charun had never seen her again, had not been able to leave a name or address for letters. But she had obviously never left his mind, not completely.

He wondered, briefly, why this boy would bring her to mind, an affair almost twenty years in the past.

But he was tired, truly tired, now and he couldn't think on it long. He organized the left-over paperwork to be completed tomorrow. Then, turning his grey-green eyes toward the light, he blew the candle out.

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A/N As always, reviews of all sorts are welcome and deeply appreciated. Thanks for reading!


	3. Just a Girl

Evvy wondered if they thought about her at all.

She wondered if her mother ever looked down at her hands and remembered how they had pushed her only daughter into the grasp of the innkeeper while the little girl wailed. Evvy thought she shouldn't be able to remember that day; she had been so young at the time. Why, then, was it engrained so well into her memory that she could recall the colour of the slaver's tunic and boots, the smell of the street, the feel of her mother's cool hands on her arm and neck. Evvy wondered if she remembered how the man had looked Evvy up and down and grinned with a smile missing teeth. Evvy wondered if her mother remembered the words she said (words Evvy remembered every day).

"We'll take what we can get for her; we know she is just a girl."

Evvy knew her mother didn't remember how Evvy was dragged off the street, screaming after her mother because Evvy watched her until the door slammed shut and Rookyia Dingzai never once turned back.

Sometimes, Evvy wondered if her father ever heard of her. She had helped destroy a palace in Chammur, had found the spirit of a mountain and taken the 'talking rock' across six countries, had been involved in a war, had stopped the destruction of a volcano... As she travelled with Briar and Rosethorn, she heard stories about her teachers and even herself from people who didn't yet know who they were talking with.

Evvy thought that even if her father had stopped to listen to the tales, he wouldn't recognize who they were talking about. After all, she was just a girl.

Evvy wondered if her brothers remembered her at all. Her youngest brother had been born only after they had fled Yanjing, and was too young to remember anything before she had been left in Chammur, but Wenzhilee and Yiaaming and Huizhaii had been older than her and would surely tell the baby about her. Evvy wondered if they would repeat their parents' thoughts or if they would remember her as more than just the girl.

On nights on the road, especially just after Briar rescued her – she always thought of him finding her that way, even if she would never boost his ego by telling him so – Evvy thought about what it would be like to see them again. The girl they sold for three times less than the cost of the rocks she carried was well on her way to becoming a mage. And even though rock magic was common as dirt, a rock mage studying with the famed Briar Moss and Rosethorn, with a mountain as a companion and becoming a novice in Winding Circle temple wasn't.

So when Evvy thought about her mother's face and her father's voice and the teasing of her brothers too long and got sad, she would imagine all the things they would think when they heard about all the great things this 'just a girl' would be capable of. Falling asleep with these thought in her head was always easier. They would love her, then (though she wasn't always sure she wanted them to), and they would beg her to come back (though Evvy knew she wouldn't) and they would regret ever seeing her as useless (this Evvy never questioned).

Truthfully, her family would never hear of her success. They would never cry on seeing her, and admit that they were wrong. They would never hear tales and wonder if it could possibly be their child. Her mother would never wish she had looked back, her father would never weep for the child he had lost, her brothers never regret the times they didn't say kind words.

Three miles west of Chammur, they were attacked by bandits and killed for the handful of coins they made from selling Evvy. Their bones lay in the sand of a ditch on the side of the road, hidden from passing travellers and far removed from the whispers of growing legend that feature the name of the last Dingzai.

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A/N Didn't see that coming, did ya?


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